The Workouts Behind Some of the World’s Fastest Marathoners—and How to Add Them to Your Schedule
A few of the fastest marathon times in the world have one coach in common: Renato Canova. This includes Germany’s Amanal Petros, the 15th-fastest marathoner in the world with a time of 2:04:03, and British distance runner Emile Cairess, who placed fourth overall in the 2024 Paris Olympic Marathon, running 2:07:29.
Canova is an Italian distance runner-turned-coach who works exclusively with elites. Over the years, run coaches across the world have adapted his training philosophy for recreational runners looking to earn their own personal record.
One of those coaches is Matt Fox, a former competitive marathoner who also became a coach and the founder of Sweat Elite. Nearly a decade ago, Fox joined a training group in Kenya where he first met Canova and gained insight on his training philosophy. “It’s been awesome to learn about his coaching because I’ve applied it to my own running, and I’ve improved from a 2:59 marathon down to a 2:18 marathon,” says Fox. “I coach 65 athletes around the world, and I apply his principles to my coaching too.”
Canova’s general approach to training is to balance endurance with speed while introducing intensity early on in training and adding more and more marathon pace volume as the build progresses, says Fox. “He knows how to add the right type of intensity, the right speeds and distances, at the right time in relation to when you want to perform best,” he says. “Canova has, in my opinion, a way to get to 100 percent of your peak.”
To apply his performance-boosting methods to your own training, we gathered a few Canova-inspired workouts and insights from run coaches, including Fox.
The Overall Approach to Training
The Canova training philosophy usually involves high volume with a huge focus on race pace, explains Fox.
Typically following a four-phase structure, Canova starts runners with easy runs, as well as hill sprints, strides, and threshold workouts to build a foundation. He then begins to lengthen the distance of long runs and threshold workouts, before zeroing in on marathon pace efforts.
To increase volume, especially volume at marathon pace, Canova includes “special blocks,” with morning and evening workouts that can average about 30 miles total for the day—most of that mileage done at marathon pace, Fox says. Of course, this only works for elite runners clocking 100-mile weeks; it’s not quite suitable for the average runner with a full-time job and other commitments outside of training. But generally speaking, the more volume you can do at race pace, the better you get at sustaining that effort.
One thing unique to Canova-style training is including weekly hill sprints at the top end of your speed throughout your build. Canova believes if you can improve your pure speed by 1 percent, then in theory, all your paces slower than that will also improve by 1 percent, Fox explains. (For a marathoner looking to break four hours, a 1 percent improvement is about 2.5 minutes, for example.) “I’ve applied that to many athletes that I coach, and it works very well,” Fox says.
While Canova’s method is advanced, Fox and other coaches have taken elements of it and applied it to recreational runners to reap the same rewards: getting better at race pace, improving speed and endurance, and ultimately fulfilling your full potential as a runner come race day.
To do that, coaches offer these three Canova-style workouts to try in your own marathon buildup, and explain how they can lead you to your best performance.
3 Marathon Workouts to Help You Run Faster
Extended Marathon Pace Long Runs
Why it works: A staple of Canova’s training is the long run with marathon pace mixed into it, Fox says. One unique aspect of Canova-style training is that he typically introduces intensity, like race pace workouts, early on in training rather than waiting for later in the build. This run might fall in Canova’s marathon-specific phase around the middle of a training block, and can become more challenging as you progress by extending the mileage.
This workout is time-based so it can apply to any marathoner with any time goal. “You’re applying the same idea of extending your marathon pace, but you’re still capping it at about two hours and 30 minutes total,” says Fox. Anything longer than that would be too taxing on your body and difficult to recover from, he notes.
How to do it:
- 75-minute easy run
- 3 x 20 minutes at marathon pace, with 5-minute jogging recovery in between
Marathon Pace Intervals
Why it works: Brant Stachel, USATF-certified endurance coach at Fast and Free Performance Coaching, was also influenced by Canova-style training methods and implements this kind of workout into his runners’ programs to help them hone in on marathon pace.
Marathon pace intervals should feel like you honestly could keep going for another 45 to 60 minutes if you had to, Stachel explains. “It really helps athletes get a big density of volume at marathon effort, but not in a big straight bout, so you can recover a bit better,” says Stachel.
He suggests doing this workout eight weeks out from marathon race day to dial in pacing and effort. It’s typically a confidence boost that you can hold pace on race day.
How to do it:
- Warm up with 10 minutes of easy running
- 6K, 5K, 4K, 3K, 2K at 100% of your marathon pace, with 1K at 80% of your marathon pace in between
- Cool down with 10 minutes of easy running
Hill Sprints
Why it works: “This session is quite unusual because if you look at it from the standpoint of physiology, doing short hill sprints of 10 seconds or 15 seconds is very anaerobic,” Fox says. But that’s not necessarily the goal. Instead, the goal is to improve your mechanics and your ability to reach a higher top speed.
Fox recommends recreational runners do hill sprints once every two weeks from the start of training through peak week.
To do this workout, find a hill with a grade of 6 to 7 percent.
How to do it:
1. Warm up with 30 minutes of easy running
2. 10 x 10- to 12-second hill sprints at an all-out effort, slowly jogging back down the hill between
3. Cool down with 30 minutes of easy running
Kristine Kearns, a writer and avid runner, joined Runner’s World and Bicycling in July 2024. She previously coached high school girls cross country and currently competes in seasonal races, with more than six years of distance training and an affinity for weightlifting. You can find her wearing purple, baking cupcakes, and visiting her local farmers market.
